STORY AND PRESERVATION 



MOUNT VERNON 




THOMAS NELSON PAGE 



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MOUNT VERNON 

AND ITS 

PRESERVATION 

1858-1910 



The Acquisition, Restoration, and Care 

of the Home of IV ashing ton by the 

Mount Vernon Ladies* Association 

of the Union for over half a 

Century 



THOMAS NELSON PAGE 






Copyright, 1910 

THE MOUNT VERNON LADIES' ASSOCIATION 
OF THE UNION 



Ube "Rnfcftetboclier ©rcss, "ftew lorft 



©CU27r;:>r:5 



I 






Mount Vernon 
Introduction 

ON the western bank of the 
Potomac River, about a score 
of miles below the Capital of 
the Nation, rises a high bluff, crowned 
by an old Virginia mansion of equal 
dignity and simplicity, surrounded by 
grounds filled with noble trees and 
flanked by the customary out-buildings 
of an old Virginia plantation of the 
better sort. To the eye of the way- 
farer, it would, even were its history 
unknown, appear, seated as it is, 
embowered in trees, a haven of rest for 
those buffeted by the storms of the 
outer world. For this is Mount Ver- 



iv ifntrobuction 



non, the home of Washington, the last 
resting place of his sacred ashes, a 
shrine for all lovers of liberty of every 
clime and every age. 

A brief history of the estate, associ- 
ated as it is with the home life of 
Washington, cannot but prove interest- 
ing, for here Washington spent most 
of his boyhood and youth, under the 
roof of his half-brother, Lawrence, 
whose early distinction imder the gal- 
lant Admiral Vernon, kindled in the 
lad's mind the martial spark, which in 
the sequel led to those victories b}^ 
which was established this Republic. 
Here, after he reached manhood, he 
pondered those great questions which 
his wisdom and character did so much 
to solve. Hence, relinquishing a life 
of ease and luxury, he went forth to 
fight the battles of his country. Here 



IfntroDuctton 



he returned after long absences to re- 
fresh his spirit in its deep tranquilHty 
— a tranquillity which he relinquished 
at the call of his countrymen to guide 
the destinies of his Country and set 
her in the way of peace and of liberty. 
And here, greater than Caesar, greater 
than Cromwell, greater than Napoleon, 
he retired, the first man in the world, 
to spend the brief evening of his life, 
an example for all mankind to emulate. 




^A^^ 



Painting by Gilbert Stuart, called the Gibbs-Channing-Avery 

portrait, deposited in the Metropolitan 

Museum of Art, New York 



From " A History of the United States and Its People," by Elroy 

McKendree Avery, by special arrangement with the Burrows 

Brothers Company, Publishers, Cleveland 



At the Council of the Board of Regents of 
the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association of the 
Union, held at Mount Vernon in May, 1 910, 
the following Resolution was adopted: 

''Resolved J the Council having approved 
and accepted the admirable paper entitled 
* MountjVernon and its Preservation,' writ- 
ten by Doctor Thomas Nelson Page, the 
same having come to the Council with the 
compliments of Doctor Page, we now ex- 
tend to him our keen appreciation of the 
gift and hearty thanks for it, giving, as 
the article does, a full and accurate ac- 
count of Mount Vernon, its history, and 
its acquisition for the Ladies' Association, 
which has held and preserved it for over 
half a century." 




Martha Washington 



Painting by Gilbert Stuart (considered the best likeness), owned 

by the Boston Athenaeum and deposited in the 

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 



From "A History of the United States and It's People" by Elroy 

McKendree Avery, by special arrangement with The Burrows 

Brothers Company, Pulilishers, Cleveland 



"Ladies, the home of Washington is in 
your charge; see to it that you keep it the 
home of Washington. Let no irreverent hand 
change it; no vandal hands desecrate it with 
the finger of progress. Those who go to the 
home in which he Hved and died, wish to see 
in what he lived and died. Let one spot in 
this grand country of ours be saved from 
change. Upon you rests this duty." 

(Ann Parmele Cunningham.) 



Illustrations 



East Front of Mansion Frontispiece ^ 


George Washington 


vi 


By Gilbert Stuart 




Martha Washington 


viii ^^ 


By Gilbert Stuart 




George Washington 


8 ^ 


Martha Washington 


i6^ 


Ann Pamela Cunningham 


24 


West Front of Mansion . 


31 


The Old Barn 


40 


Out-Buildings 


46 


Walk to River 


50 


Washington's Bedroom . 


58 


Martha Washington's Bedroom 


64V 


Nellie Custis's Bedroom 


66 


The Water Front .... 


76 


Wedding Day of Nellie Custis 


80 


Tomb of Washington 


82 



/ 



Mount Vernon and Its Preservation 

THE history of Mount Vernon, 
properly presented, should be 
one of the most interesting 
stories that cotild be written, and, 
however presented, associated as the 
place is with the home life of Wash- 
1 ington, and as the repository of his 

I sacred ashes, it cannot but prove 

I interesting. Whatever his accomplish- 

I ment in his mighty career, whatever 

the fruitage, of which the world has 
been partaker, here was the garden 
where his powers sprang, here the soil 
in which they reached their complete 
J vigor and ripeness, and here by his 

\ desire, at his death his sacred ashes 

were laid. 



/IDount IDernon 



It may be well at the start, for a 
complete understanding of the present 
condition of the place, to trace the title 
to the estate, down to the hands of its 
present owners and faithful guardians. 

The title to Mount Vernon is, like 
many of the old Virginia titles, an easy 
one to trace, for even where written 
records fail, as sometimes they do 
through carelessness or destruction by 
war, the title has generally passed 
through few hands, and has remained 
in the same family for so many genera- 
tions as to be a part of the known 
history of the family. 

Mount Vernon was a part of that 
great tract known in Virginia history 
as the Northern Neck, comprised be- 
tween the Potomac and the Rappahan- 
nock rivers, which Charles II. in his 
heedlessness undertook to grant to his 



jflDount Demon 



favorites, Lords Culpeper and Ariing- 
ton. Virginia, ever jealous of her 
rights, threatened to flame into revolu- 
tion over the high-handed act of the 
thoughtless King, so that the larger 
portion of the grant was withdrawn; 
but it appears that this portion of it 
continued, or, at least, the color of 
title to it continued in Lord Culpeper, 
for we find in the beginning of the 
chain of title: 

1. A grant from Lord Culpeper to 
Nicholas Spenser and John Washing- 
ton, in 1674. Thus, the Washingtons 
derived title straight from the grantee 
of the Crown. 

2. We find on record in the Land 
Office of Virginia, in Richmond, a 
grant from George H. Jeffreys to 
Nicholas Spenser and John Washing- 
ton for 5000 acres of land in 1679. 



flDount Demon 



3. The will of John Washington, 
on record in Westmoreland County, 
devised in 1686 his share of the above 
land to his son, Lawrence Washington. 

4. The division of the above land, 
5000 acres, between Spenser and Wash- 
ington in 1690, is on record in the 
County of Stafford, and we find 
Augustine Washington, son of this 
Lawrence Washington, in possession 
of one half of the above 5000 acres in 
1740. The "Survey and division be- 
tween Spenser and Washington, Sep- 
tember and December, 1690" — the 
title endorsed on the instrument in the 
handwriting of George Washington — 
stating the terms of division of the 5000 
acres purchased in 1679, by John Wash- 
ington and Nicholas Spenser, is in the 
possession of the Mount Vernon Ladies' 
Association of the Union, the eldest son 
of John Augustine Washington having 
sold the estate to this Association. 

5. A deed from Augustine Wash- 



/Rount Demon 



ington, conveying said 2500 acres to 
his son, Lawrence Washington, re- 
corded at a session of the General 
Court of Virginia, held at the Capital, 
October 28, 1740. 

6. The will of Augustine Washing- 
ton confirming the above deed of 1740 
recorded in King George County, 
May, 1743. 

7. The will of Lawrence Washing- 
ton, made in 1 752, devising the said 2500 
acres (called by him " Mount Vernon ") 
to his daughter for her life, and after 
her death to his younger half-brother, 
George Washington, probated in Fair- 
fax County, November 26, 1 752. Under 
this will, the daughter having died in 
infancy, George' Washington became 
the owner of Mount Vernon. 

8. The will of George Washington 
devising Mount Vernon and about 
4000 acres to his nephew, BuvShrod 
Washington, on record about 1800 in 
Fairfax County. 



/©ount IDernon 



9. The will of Bushrod Washington, 
devising Mount Vernon and the lands 
(by old survey amounting to 1225 acres) 
to his nephew, John A. Washington, 
on record in Fairfax County, 1829 or 
1830. 

10. The will of John A. Washington 
devising all his property to his wife, 
Jane C. Washington, during her widow- 
hood, with the power to devise it as she 
pleased among his children, on record 
in Jefferson County (formerly Virginia, 
now West Virginia), 1842. 

11. A deed from Mrs. Jane C. 
Washington, widow of John A. Wash- 
ington, to her late husband's oldest son, 
John A. Washington, conveying to him 
(under the power of appointment given 
her by her husband's will) Mount 
Vernon and 1220 acres attached to 
it — on record in Fairfax County, 1850. 

12. The will of Mrs. Jane C. Wash- 
ington, widow of John Washington, de- 
vising Mount Vernon to her husband's 



UDount Demon 



aforesaid son, John A. Washington, 
confirming the deed she had already 
made to him — on record in Jefferson 
County (formerly Virginia, now West 
Virginia), 1855. 

13. A contract between John A. 
Washington and the Mount Vernon 
Ladies* Association of the Union (a 
corporation chartered under Act of 
the Legislature of Virginia, passed 
March 19, 1858) for the purchase of 
202 acres of the above land, on record 
in Fairfax County, April 6, 1858. 

14. A deed dated the 12th day of 
November, 1858, made in pursuance 
of the contract previously cited, by 
W. A. Taylor, Commissioner, and the 
heirs of John A'. Washington, conveying 
to the Mount Vernon Ladies' Associa- 
tion the Mount Vernon buildings and 
tombs, with 202 acres of land. 

15. As to a part of the estate, a 
deed of the 23rd of July, 1887, from 
J. Gould and wife, conveying to the 



jflDount Demon 



Mount Vernon Ladies' Association an 
adjoining parcel of 333^ acres, being a 
part of the original Mount Vernon 
estate, which was conveyed to J. 
Gould by a deed from Lawrence Wash- 
ington and wife simultaneously with 
the execution of the deed of Gould and 
wife to the Mount Vernon Ladies' 
Association, the said Lawrence Wash- 
ington having inherited this tract of 
33^2 acres from his father, John A. 
Washington. 

This is the unbroken chain by which 
the legal title to Mount Vernon, at the 
time when the estate was about to be 
lost forever to the people of the coun- 
try, became vested in the patriotic Asso- 
ciation known as the Mount Vernon 
Ladies' Association of the Union, who 
hold it under the laws of Virginia, as a 
trust "Sacred to the memory of George 




George Washington 



/IDount Demon 



Washington. " But the mere recorded 
title gives Httle idea of the wonderful 
struggle made by those through whose 
tireless zeal and unending efforts the 
estate was finally reposed and pre- 
served in the hands of this unique 
body of guardians, or of the devotion, 
fidelity, and taste with which they have 
executed their trust. ^ 

To attempt any adequate description 
of Mount Vernon or of Washington's 
personal association with his beloved 
home would far exceed the limits of 

1 The foregoing account of the title of the most 
interesting of all American homes, is taken from the 
able and careful report made in 1901 by the Virginia 
Board of Visitors to' Mount Vernon for that year, to 
the Honorable J. Hoge Tyler, Governor of Virginia. 
This report, containing as it does the result of the 
laborious investigation made at that time, gives in 
succinct and accurate form the history of the title to 
the estate, and of its government by the present owners, 
and to this work the present writer refers his readers 
and desires to acknowledge in the fullest possible way 
his indebtedness for the greater portion of this paper. 



10 /ftount Demon 

this paper. It is more than probable 
that Washington was the only man on 
American soil who could have brought 
the Revolutionary War to a triumphant 
conclusion. It is as certain as anything 
in history can be, that without Wash- 
ington the history of. this nation and 
the history of representative govern- 
ment and of Liberty throughout the 
world would have been different from 
what it is. But further, it is more than 
possible, that without Mount Vernon 
Washington himself might not have 
been precisely what he was. That 
unique balance of power that differen- 
tiates him from all other men of all 
times might not have existed but for 
the conditions in which it had its 
growth and ultimate maturity. In all 
the years of his activity, so fateful to 
mankind, beginning as it were with 



/iDount Demon ii 



his very boyhood, who may tell what 
part in the mighty restilt was due to 
the simplicity, quietude, and dignity 
of this country place, so persuasive of 
reflection and so inspiring to high 
thought, seated as it is on the bluff 
overlooking the broad and tranquil 
river with its ever changing face and its 
never changing flow. From the time 
when, as a stalwart lad he first became 
an inmate of his older brother's beauti- 
ful home and saw fit to take time to 
write down "Rules for Behavior in 
Company and Conversation," down 
to the eve of the day when, with a 
fame greater than that of any man in 
the world, his ashes were laid to rest at 
his request within the beloved precincts 
of his grounds, Mount Vernon cast 
its influence over his life and was the 
object of his unceasing affection. He 



12 /iDount Demon 

received it not by inheritance, but as a 
gift from his older half-brother as a 
token of gratitude for the affection 
which had led him to go as his com- 
panion and nurse to Barbadoes and the 
Bermudas, during the former's decline. 
And curiously enough, from this time, 
during all the years that it remained in 
the Washington family the place never 
passed by inheritance, but always by 
gift or devise, to the next possessor. 

Finally, as we have seen, Mount 
Vernon passed into the possession of 
Mr. John Augustine Washington, a 
grand-nephew of Bushrod Washington, 
and, like many of the old Virginia 
seats, the revenues from it were unequal 
to the demands made on it. Agricul- 
tural conditions were changing rapidly. 
The land at Mount Vernon, never very 
rich, was steadily growing less fertile. 



/iDount IDetnon 13 

The development of the great estates 
in the South and the opening up of 
the rich regions beyond the Ohio and 
the Mississippi brought a change of 
conditions, with which Virginia could 
not compete successfully. The key 
in which the life of the country gentry 
was cast was one which called for a 
large expenditure. The rule was to 
keep open house for all who came. 
The hospitality was of the abounding 
kind. No class of men ever had 
greater calls made on their generosity 
or responded more graciously, and 
when to the customary demand was 
added, in thia case, that which sprang 
from the position of Mount Vernon as 
the most noted and most visited country 
seat on the continent, the exactions were 
far more than any private fortune in 
Virginia could support. Thus, Mount 



14 /IDount IDetnon 

Vernon gradually began to "go down" 
as the expressive phrase runs, and no 
zeal of the master, however patriotic 
and filial, was equal to its preservation. 
Doubtless, of all who deplored the fact, 
none deplored it so much as he, and no 
chapter in the history of the estate is 
more moving than that in which 
the country gentleman on whose 
shoulders rested the burden and re- 
sponsibility of preserving the estate, 
in a manner befitting its fame, strove 
to bear them. The same exactions 
had reduced Jefferson from affluence 
to poverty, as far less exactions had 
impoverished less well known men, 
masters of other and Jess well known 
estates. 

Both the United States and the 
State of Virginia had the chance to be- 
come the owner of Mount Vernon, and 



/IDount Demon 15 

both declined it, not once but several 
times; and both failed to avail them- 
selves of the opportunity. 

John A. Washington, the elder, the 
nephew of Bushrod and the ^tie^ of /^f'^^^^^^^ 
the grantor to the Mount Vernon 
Ladies' Association, foreseeing the dif- 
ficulty of a private individual's keep- 
ing up the estate and preserving it 
in a manner commensurate with the 
dignity of its associations, added a 
codicil to his will on July 8, 1830, 
providing for the disposal of the place 
to the United States, should the Con- 
gress desire to possess it. Nothing, 
however, came of this proposal, and 
later on his immediate successor and 
namesake, recognizing the drift of the 
times and seeing the impossibility of 
keeping up the estate, made another 
attempt to place it beyond the danger 



1 6 /iDount IDernon 

of destruction by proposing to dispose 
of it to either the State of Virginia or 
the United States Government. Nego- 
tiations had been attempted with the 
owner from various directions with a 
view to purchasing the estate, by- 
persons who foresaw that such a deal 
might subsequently prove remunerative 
to them, but all such offers, naturally, 
were promptly rejected. The rumor, 
however, having got abroad that 
speculative persons were desirous of 
availing themselves of the difficulties 
that beset the owner of the estate, the 
Governor of Virginia, the Honorable 
Joseph Johnson, on December 5, 1853, 
transmitted to the General Assembly 
of the State an earnest recommendation 
that the State of Virginia should pur- 
chase the property from its owner. His 
message upon this subject is as follows: 




Martha Washington 



/iDount IDernon 17 



I cannot refrain from respectfully 
and earnestly recommending to the 
Legislature the propriety of the pur- 
chase of Mount Vernon by the State 
of Virginia, and I do so at this time 
more particularly, as there is reason to 
apprehend that it is about to pass 
into the hands of strangers. The 
importance of the acquisition of this 
property by the United States has fre- 
quently been brought to the attention 
of Congress, and it is surprising that 
this commendable project has met with 
so little favor. For this we should ever 
feel thankful, because if once the 
property of the Federal Government, 
we might never have been able to 
purchase it. This should never be. 
Whilst we might reasonably prefer that 
it should be the property of the Union, 
rather than belong to any private 
individual, yet Virginia, and she only, 
should be the owner and have control 
of this sacred spot, where rest the 



i8 /iDount Demon 



mortal remains of her immortal son. 
Who else but Virginia should own this 
hallowed spot, and guard and protect 
the grave of him whose name will be 
revered as long as one shall live to 
admire American liberty? — and should 
some ruthless hand ever disturb the 
sepulchre of the honored dead, or 
even change the primitive simplicity of 
his former residence, a sense of shame 
would come over every Virginian, and 
he would feel that that had been a loss 
which could not be estimated in dollars 
and cents. If it can be purchased, then, 
upon fair and reasonable terms, let us 
do it at once, that we may preserve it 
in its primitive simplicity and beauty, 
to be freely resorted to by all admirers 
of true greatness and human liberty, 
and be gazed on by all who pass upon 
the beautiful Potomac. 

Considering the character of him 
whose name has thrown this halo of 
glory around the spot, and in view of 



/iDount IDernon 19 



the fact that, foremost as usual in 
whatever was good and great, he 
presided over the first agricultural 
society that ever met in Virginia, I do 
not know that the property could be 
more appropriately disposed of than 
to convert it into a model farm, and 
establish upon it a State agricultural 
school. If this disposition should not 
meet with your approbation, then it 
might be well to consider the propriety 
of establishing there a literary institu- 
tion of some kind upon a different basis ; 
the first object, however, should be the 
acquisition of the property. 

The General Assembly took up the 
matter seriously; for all felt the need 
of preserving the place hallowed by 
such memories. 

On December 17th, that portion of 
the Governor's message relative to the 
purchase of Mount Vernon was, on 



CO /IDount Demon 

motion, referred to a committee of five, 
with instructions to inquire into the 
expediency of purchasing the same on 
behalf of the State. Also to inquire 
as to the price and terms upon which 
such purchase might be negotiated, 
and as to what disposition should 
be made of this sacred homestead of 
our illustrious patriot if it should be 
found expedient for the State to 
purchase the same. This committee 
immediately began a correspondence 
with Mr. John A. Washington, the 
owner of Mount Vernon, informing him 
of the purpose of their organization 
and solicited a free commimication of 
his views on the subject. In reply, 
dated the 31st of December, Mr. 
Washington expressed his willingness 
to alien the property to the State, and 
proposed definite terms on which he 



/IDount Demon 21 

was disposed to transfer the property. 
The committee suggested, in return, 
a modification of his terms; but the 
negotiation failed and the committee, 
on the 3d of March, 1854, reported its 
failure and expressed regret that they 
had not been able to see the propriety 
under the conditions of the State's 
finances, of recommending the acqui- 
sition of the property on the terms 
proposed, whereupon they were, on 
their request, discharged from further 
consideration of the subject. 

In view of the failure of both the 
National Government and of Virginia 
to avail themselves of the opportunity 
to become the owner of Mount Vernon, 
the danger became imminent that in no 
long time it might pass into the hands 
of strangers, who might possibly specu- 
late on the fame of the greatest citizen 



22 /iDount Demon 



of all time. It was at this time that 
Providence appears to have pointed 
the way to its preservation by the only 
means which possibly would have saved 
it — the devotion of the women of the 
^country. A movement was set on 
foot by patriotic ladies to save this 
precious home as the shrine and heritage 
of all Americans, which resiilted, after 
long years of heroic effort and self- 
denial, in the present happy condition, 
where it is held by the Mount Vernon 
Ladies' Association of the Union. The 
story of this movement reads like a 
romance. 

It was the custom for steamboats 
plying along the Potomac to toll their 
bells as they passed Mount Vernon. 
The custom had begun when the death 
of the Father of his Country on that 
December night, at the very close of the 



/Biount Demon 23 

last century, had plunged the nation in 
grief, and had been continued reverently 
ever since. It was known all over the 
country. It is probable that no way- 
farer ever passed along the river with- 
out being solemnized by this tribute 
of national respect ; and but few passed 
who failed to reflect that in the course 
of time and before very long, the home 
of Washington would be subdivided 
and pass into the hands of strangers. 
Possibly the wish entered many hearts 
that this impending fate might be 
averted and the home of Washington 
be spared to show to future generations 
what it was when Washington conse- 
crated it with his presence. But of 
all the multitude that passed by no one 
appears to have done more than wish 
for its preservation, until one moonlit 
night in 1853. 



24 /IDount IDernon 

^"In South Carolina, the land of 
sentiment, dwelt Mrs. Robert Cun- 
ningham, who had been bom in Alex- 
andria, Va., six years before the 
death of Washington, and whose 
father and grandfather were vestrymen 
with George Washington, of old Christ 
Church in Alexandria. She came of 
a family noted for its patriotism, and 
two of her aunts had married dis- 
tinguished Pennsylvanians : one of them 
James Wilson and the other George 
Ross, both signers of the Declaration 
of Independence. She was the mother 
of several children, among them a 
young daughter, by name Ann Pamela, 
who, from her childhood, was the 
victim of some spinal trouble, which 
eventually made her a hopeless in- 
valid and confined her to her couch. 
During the early childhood of this 




Ann Pamela Cunningham 



/iDount IDernon 25 

daughter, Mrs. Cunningham, on one 
occasion during a trip North, spent a 
week at Mount Vernon with her two 
children, one of whom was Ann Pamela, 
then but a few years old. Many years 
afterward as Mrs. Cunningham was on 
her way to Philadelphia to place her 
invalid daughter under the care of a 
noted physician, in passing Mount 
Vernon on the boat, as the bell tolled 
she realized the full import of the 
situation, and she communicated to her 
daughter the idea that other means of 
preserving the home of Washington 
for the country having failed, the 
women of the coimtry should take the 
matter in hand and preserve it. ^y 

Fired with this suggestion. Miss ^^ 
Ann Pamela Cunningham from her 
invalid chair conceived, projected, and, 
against all obstacles, carried through to 



26 /iDount IDernon 

triumphant success the lofty and com- 
prehensive plan which, after years of 
endeavor and toil not only secured the 
preservation of Mount Vernon for the 
people of this country, but saved it in 
the best way it could have been saved. 
For she placed it under the law, in the 
faithful custody of the Mount Vernon 
Ladies' Association, — ^an Association 
probably better constituted to keep 
this national treasure of patriotic 
sentiment national, and at the same 
time close to the hearts of the people, 
than any other imaginable organiza- 
tion could have been. The great idea 
suggested to the invalid lady by her 
mother appears to have taken immedi- 
ate and absolute possession of her. 
*'I will do it" was her instant deci- 
sion, and she set lierself promptly to 
the task. Her friends and relatives 



/IDount Demon 27 

endeavored to dissuade her from her 
purpose. It was an impossible under- 
taking they argued, her strength was 
not equal to it and in truth it must 
have appeared so to those who knew 
the frail invalid stretched on her 
couch. But in that feeble frame was 
encased a bold and aspiring spirit, 
a soul equal to any undertaking — 
type of the kind that have carried the 
Anglo-Saxon civilization to the fore- 
front and declared its base to be de- 
votion to virtue, public and private. 
Her first step was a proof that she 
possessed a clear and comprehensive 
intellect. It Was the recognition of the 
great fact, unknown to many women 
and to nearly all men at that time, that 
the women of the country possessed a 
vast store of energy and ability, un- 
developed and unused. This she would 



38 /IDount Demon 

call into exercise and employ. Having 
formulated her plan, that the women 
of America should purchase and pre- 
serve the home of Washington, she 
set to work with courage, wisdom, and 
devotion. 

On the 3d of December, 1853, two 
days before the date of Governor 
Johnson's message to the Legislature 
of Virginia, recommending that Virginia 
purchase and save the home of Wash- 
ington, she issued her first appeal to the 
women of the country, urging upon 
them the high duty of raising a fund 
to preserve the home of Washington. 
And, as it was deemed improper for 
a lady to take part in public affairs, 
she used the nom-de-plume, '*A 
Southern Matron," a term which be- 
came widely known in the sequel. At 
first, it appears that this appeal was 



/JDount li)ernon 29 

made only to the women of the South; 
but this naturally drew forth the pro- 
test from women in other parts of the 
Union that "whatever else was sectional 
Washington belonged to the whole 
country." This view Miss Cunning- 
ham was prompt to accept, and the 
appeal was quickly made to embrace 
the entire body of American women. 
The first public meeting to raise funds 
appears to have been held on the 226. 
of February, 1854, in Laurens, S. C, 
Miss Cunningham's home. At this 
m^eeting, $293.75 was raised, the first 
fruit of the great movement inaugurated 
by her. The ^ next organized meeting 
would appear to have been held in 
Richmond, Va., on the evening of 
July 12, 1854, when about thirty 
ladies assembled for the purpose of 
forming an Association to raise money 



30 /iDount Demon 

to aid in purchasing Mount Vernon, 
to be held in trust by the Governor 
of Virginia and his successors. This 
meeting was attended by a number 
of distinguished gentlemen, including 
Governor Johnson, who in a brief 
address to them referred to the un- 
successful effort in which he had taken 
part, when a member of Congress, to 
induce the United States Government 
to purchase Mount Vernon, as well 
as to the failure of the Legislature of 
Virginia to take over the place, and of 
various other movements having in 
view the same object. 

On the assembling of the Virginia 
Legislature the next winter. Governor 
Johnson, in his annual message of De- 
cember 3, 1855, again referred to his 
former recommendation, which he sub- 
stantially repeated, and alluded to the 



/IDount IDernon 31 

fact that however ready Virginia might 
be to purchase and pay for the hallowed 
shades and sacred relics of Mount 
Vernon, that honor had been partially 
wrested from her, and had been ''re- 
served for the noble purpose of adorn- 
ing the brow of female philanthropy.** 
He reported that the Mount Vernon 
Association of Ladies had been zeal- 
ously engaged in the collecting of 
funds, and that ''they magnanimously 
claimed the honor," he states, ''of 
paying the purchase money, and, with 
becoming modesty, requested the Gen- 
eral Assembly to authorize the purchase 
in the name of the Commonwealth, so 
that the title may be vested in Virginia 
and the property be under their control 
and direction, with the assurance to all 
that the sacred repository of the mighty 
dead will be forever kept from pollution.*' 



32 /IDount Demon 

Upon this recommendation, on the 
14th of December, 1855, a committee 
on the ptirchase of Mount Vernon by 
the State of Virginia was appointed,' 
and a bill was reported on Januar^^ 10, 
1 856, authorizing the purchase of Mount 
Vernon with 200 acres of land, includ- 
ing the mansion, tomb, garden, groimds, 
and wharf of Mount Vernon, and was 
passed on the 17th of March, 1856, 
with only two votes against it. Un- 
derlying much of the secret hostility, 
was the opposition to any plan of 
so far-reaching a scope being con- 
ducted by a woman. The proposal 
was ridiciiled as chimerical, and re- 
sisted as unwise, a term broad enough 
to embrace all conceivable objections. 
Letters were written against the work 
that had been undertaken and the 
promoters became the objects not only 



/IDount Demon 33 

of derision but almost of obloquy. The 
objection to women ''mixing in public 
affairs'* soon aroused strong hostility 
to the idea, and later a distinguished 
editor and member of Congress entered 
the lists in ardent opposition, for the 
purpose of defeating the bill which 
had been introduced in the General 
Assembly of Virginia to effectuate and 
carry out the purpose of the Associa- 
tion which Miss Cunningham's genius 
had called into being. But a stronger 
force than- that of any man or group of 
men had been enlisted, the force of the 
aroused interest of the women of the 
coimtry — aroused by a lofty and un- 
selfish sentiment, and, under this crea- 
tive power a public opinion was being 
formed which swept over all opposition 
and carried Miss Cunningham's plan to 
a triumphant conclusion. 



34 /IDount IDernon 

Associations were formed in State 
after State and contributions began to 
pour in from all sides. Possibly the 
one most important ally among the 
men who came to the aid of the ladies 
in their pious work was secured when 
Miss Cunningham in March, 1856, in 
furtherance of her plan, having trav- 
elled to Richmond in great suffering, 
met Edward Everett, who had gone 
there to deliver his renowned eulogy 
on Washington. Her unselfish zeal and 
patriotism and her inspiring devotion 
to the task to which she had set her- 
self, made such an impression on Mr. 
Everett, then regarded as possibly 
the first orator of the country, that he 
dedicated thenceforth the proceeds of 
his lecture to her pious enterprise, 
and, in the sequel, contributed to the 
fund from his receipts the munificent 



/iDount Demon 35 



sum of $69,964; but even more than 
this was the aid he furnished by be- 
coming Miss Cunningham's most earn- 
est and most eloquent champion. 

From this it will be seen that the 
first idea of Miss Cunningham was to 
have the women of the country raise 
the fund for the purchase of the place, 
but for the place itself to be conveyed 
to the State of Virginia in a form which 
would have made the State the abso- 
lute owner. Very little success, how- 
ever, appears to have attended the 
attempt to carry out this plan. The 
class to whom the appeal was made 
was not interested in purchasing pro- 
perty and donating it to the State of 
Virginia. The point was naturally 
made that, if the State of Virginia 
desired to become the owner of Wash- 
ington's home, she should appropriate 



36 /IDount Demon 

the money to pay for it. In this state 
of the case the views of Miss Cunning- 
ham, who was the leading spirit in the 
entire movement, imderwent a change; 
and, imdaunted by her first failure, she 
conceived the idea of having the 
women of the coimtry not only raise 
the money for the purchase of Mount 
Vernon, but hold it themselves in 
trust for the people of the country, 
and to this end she now addressed 
herself. 

It would be an interesting as well as 
a curious study to go into the obstacles 
encountered by Miss Cunningham and 
those who united with her in the work 
of carrying out her plan to completion. 
To add to the difficulties of raising the 
fund necessary to secure Mount Vernon, 
came the great panic of 1857 which 
caused a pall of financial distress to 



/IDount IDernon 37 

fall over the whole country. In the 
midst of this came, like a thunder- 
clap, the announcement that Mr. 
Washington found the obstacles in the 
way of his transferring the estate 
under the new plan proposed insuper- 
able. He could not bring himself to 
transfer the property to any purchaser 
except the State of Virginia. All the 
efforts which had been made by the 
women of the country and their 
friends appeared to have been thrown 
away. Even the integrity of the As- 
sociation was attacked by the press. 
Mr. Washington was criticised and 
angered. Contributions ceased. The 
cause appeared absolutely and hope- 
lessly lost. One more effort was made 
in the House of Delegates in Virginia 
to induce the General Assembly to 
meet the situation by issuing bonds for 



38 /IDount IDernon 

$200,000, the amount asked, and be- 
come the purchaser, looking to reim- 
bursement later on at the hands of the 
women of the country. It was ex- 
plained that Mr. Washington, the 
proprietor of Mount Vernon, had ab- 
solutely refused to sell the estate or 
any portion of it unless the State of 
Virginia became the purchaser. The 
bill, however, thus introduced, failed 
on a vote of 39 Ayes to 57 Noes; where- 
upon the mover of the bill, Mr. Chap- 
man, stated that he would later on 
offer a substitute, a mere act of incor- 
poration of the Mount Vernon Ladies' 
Association, to which there could be 
no objection. Accordingly, on the 
19th of March, 1858, an act of incor- 
poration of the Mount Vernon Ladies' 
Association was passed by both houses 
of the General Assembly of Virginia, 



/IDount IDernon 39 

under which this Association received 
and now holds the title to the hallowed 
shades and sacred relics of Mount 
Vernon. This title is indefeasible ex- 
cept by the Association's ceasing to 
exist, or failing to perform its trust 
of preserving the place sacred to the 
Father of his Country. In such case 
the place reverts to the State of 
Virginia, and the Governor of Virginia 
appoints annually five visitors to Mount 
Vernon, to represent the interest of the 
State therein. 

In the critical juncture referred to, 
when Mount Vernon appeared irre- 
trievably lost, Miss Cunningham dis- 
played new powers. She proved, as was 
well said by Mr. Chapman, that where 
faith is placed in the assurance of the 
ladies, what they engage to do will 
be done, and "a man with his puny 



40 /IDount IDernon 

arms might as well attempt to pluck 
roses from the shrubbery of the moon 
as to attempt to thwart their resolu- 
tion.*' Confined to her couch, a hope- 
less invalid, Miss Cunningham could 
not travel by train save for the shortest 
distance, but she could travel by boat, 
and she determined to see Mr. Wash- 
ington herself, and endeavor to induce 
him to retire from his resolution. In 
pursuance of this determination she 
painfully made the journey from 
Charleston to Baltimore by boat, and 
thence to Mount Vernon. 

She was hospitably received, but her 
arguments and expostulations alike 
failed to move Mr. Washington from 
a position founded on sentiment. She 
was borne in her chair back to the 
landing to take the boat, but pro- 
videntially the boat had left, and, after 



J 



/IDount Demon 41 

waiting for some time in the stream, 
in a skiff, for the mail-boat, she was 
compelled to return and take refuge 
for the night at Mount Vernon. The 
accident thought so disastrous at the 
moment proved to be providential. 

In the pleasant intercourse of the 
family circle' that evening. Miss Cun- 
ningham learned the secret of Mr. 
Washington's opposition. He had re- 
ceived the impression that the General 
Assembly of the State and the Ladies' 
Association had united to reflect on 
him. She was fortunately able to 
remove the impression, declaring that 
the ladies fully appreciated the fact 
that the charter proposed was not 
acceptable to him, and that she would 
do all in her power to secure one that 
was. To her joy, the following morn- 
ing she discovered that her indo- 



42 /iDount IDernon 

mitable devotion had so impressed 
him, that he had come around to her 
point of view, and that the day was won. 
But then began another struggle. 
Under the chilHng influence of dis- 
appointment, ardor had died out. It 
was hard to reHght the old fires, and it 
required another period of anxiety and 
toil before enthusiasm could be re- 
kindled. But the spirit of woman was 
equal to the task. All over the country 
they were working and inspiring others 
to take up the task. Miss Hamilton 
in New York, through her efforts, 
raised about one fifth of the fimd 
needed; Mrs. Greenough in Massachu- 
setts, aided by Mrs. Ritchie of Virginia, 
who went there to give readings for 
the cause, did her great share; Miss 
Macalister of Pennsylvania secured 
general subscriptions — and so, in State 



/iDount IDernon 43 

after State Associations were formed 
to carry on the work of love and 
patriotism. 

When at length all difficulties were 
removed and all legal requirements 
were met v/ith, and the final act was 
necessary to pass the title that should 
transfer Mount Vernon into the pious 
care of those whose zeal and patriotism 
had provided for its permanent pre- 
servation for the whole people of the 
coimtry and for all lovers of liberty 
the world over; the strain had been 
so great on the devoted woman who 
had given her life to this cause, that 
she fell into a physical collapse, and 
it was feared that the breath might 
forsake her exhausted body before she 
was able to sign the document necessary 
to complete the great transaction. 
She had to be lifted up by Mrs. Ritchie, 



44 /IDount Demon 

who was with her, and the pen placed 
in her nervous hand as though she were 
a dying woman. She could write only 
a few letters at a time, but finally the 
signature was affixed, the long struggle 
was ended, and the home of Washing- 
ton was placed, at last, in the custody 
of those faithful women who had saved 
it, as trustees, for posterity. 

The contract under which the 
Association became the owners of 
Mount Vernon, was signed April 6, 
1858. 

Thus, we have seen that the present 
owners of Mount Vernon not only 
became such at the cost of great toil 
and sacrifice, when both the State and 
Federal authorities declined to in- 
tervene — ^for what appeared to them, 
and probably rightly, sound reasons; 
but, by this toil and sacrifice they 



/IDount Demon 45 

rescued it from probable destruction, 
and restored it and preserved it for the 
people of the country as nearly as 
possible as it was when Washington 
consecrated it with his presence. And 
it is, moreover, probable that this 
Association is the only one who might 
have been able to preserve it in such 
form. It has been seen that the 
Governor of Virginia, in his message, 
suggested that, in order to preserve 
it, it might be necessary to utilize it 
as a model farm or at least as an edu- 
cational institution of some kind, and 
no one can tell in what form it might 
have been preserved at the hands of any 
Government, whether State or Federal. 
The chief beauties of the work of the 
A/Jount Vernon Ladies* Association, 
after the fact of its nationally patriotic 
character, are: 



46 /iDount IDernon 

First : That they have restored and 
preserved for posterity this precious 
old colonial home precisely as it was 
in Washington's day; so that when all 
other seats of great men shall have 
yielded to the change of fashion, this 
shall remain as it was when Washing- 
ton ennobled it by his presence. Here 
future generations shall come and dis- 
cover that neither grandeur nor splen- 
dor are needed for greatness. Secondly : 
That all that has been accomplished by 
them has been done from motives of 
the purest patriotism and the loftiest 
sentiment, with no other reward to 
themselves than that which comes to 
high minded women from the con- 
sciousness of performing duty and 
making sacrifices for the object of their 
purest affection. Except for the reason- 
able sum! paid the superintendent of 



/iDount IDeruon 47 

the grounds and buildings and to the 
caretakers under his charge, not a cent 
comes to them in any manner, directly 
or indirectly, or is applied otherwise 
than to the maintenance and preser- 
vation of the place. No one in the 
Association receives any salary what- 
ever. Their sole reward is having 
preserved Mount Vernon, "sacred to 
the memory of the Father of his 
Country." 

In proof of the appreciation of the 
sacredness of the spot is the fact that 
during the War no act of vandalism 
was committed there by either side. 
Colonel Upton ^ Herbert, a Virginian, 
placed there by the Association, re- 
mained on the spot undisturbed. 
Passes were given to the Regents to 
visit the place when no other persons 
could pass through the lines. The 



48 /iDount Demon 

members of contending armies on 
approaching its precincts sounded a 
truce, and, stacking arms outside, trod 
the hallowed ground with reverent feet. 
It testifies alike to the wisdom with 
which the first Regent had laid out her 
plan to make this a trust for all Ameri- 
cans, and to the faith with which it had 
been carried out. 

In brief, Miss Cunningham's plan for 
the preservation and government of 
Mount Vernon was to have a body of 
Regents composed of ladies represent- 
ing every State in which any part was 
taken in the movement inaugurated by 
her; these ladies to elect from their 
number a President, who should be 
known as the Regent, while the rest of 
them should be called Vice-Regents. 
In pursuance of this plan there are now 
Vice-Regents from the States of Ala- 



/IDount Demon 49 

bama, Arkansas, California, Connecti- 
cut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, 
Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, 
Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, 
Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, 
New York, North Carolina, Ohio, 
Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, 
South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Vir- 
ginia, Washington, West Virginia, and 
the District of Columbia. There 
have been, within the fifty odd years 
that have elapsed since the organ- 
ization came into being, only four 
Regents. First, the founder. Miss 
Ann Pamela Cunningham of South 
Carolina, who presided from 1853 to 
1873, the year before her death, when 
she resigned on account of her incapacity 
longer to perform her duties ; secondly, 
Mrs. Lily M. Berghman of Pennsyl- 
vania, who presided from 1874 ^ntil her 



50 mount IDernon 

death in 1891; thirdly, Mrs. Justine 
Van Renssalaer Townsend of New 
York, who presided until 1909, when, 
fourthly, Miss Harriet C. Comegys of 
Delaware was chosen and is now 
Regent. 

To get a true idea of the work of the 
Association, one should see them at 
work. The earnest zeal, the refined 
taste, the pious service with which 
every step is taken, speak alike for the 
wisdom with which the plan was first 
conceived and the continued inspira- 
tion with which it has been carried 
on through the years. 

The raising of the fund of $200,000 
which was the original price paid for the 
estate, was far from all which the Re- 
gents had to do. The place at the 
time of its purchase was in a dilapidated 
condition, due to causes which have 




Walk to Fiver 



/IDount IDetnon 5! 



already been stated. The Regents of 
the Association set before themselves 
the task of restoring the place, as near 
as possible, to the condition in which it 
was during Washington's lifetime, and 
thus to preserve it. It was necessary 
to rebuild out-buildings which had 
perished; to construct a sea-wall to 
protect the front lawn with its fine 
trees, from the erosion of the tides 
which were steadily undermining the 
bluffs, and especially to preserve the 
tomb from the effects of damp. 

To meet the situation it was necessary 
to raise over and above the amount of 
the purchase price, funds sufficient for 
this purpose and to maintain it in the 
future. As a part of their plan they 
proposed to secure the return, if possible, 
of such relics connected with Washing- 
ton and Mount Vernon as might be 



52 /IDount Demon 

found scattered throughout the country, 
and of all articles of furniture which 
had been there in Washington's life- 
time, and this was to be done in such 
a way as to emphasize the character 
of the place as a home and avoid as far 
as possible the characteristics of a 
museum. How they have succeeded 
in their pious task let the multitude 
of pilgrims say, who daily repair with 
reverent feet and sobered minds to this 
shrine of American liberty. 

Unfortunately, a great many articles, 
including almost the entire library of 
Washington, were placed beyond the 
hope of recovery, having been secured 
by other public institutions or being in 
the possession of those who were un- 
willing to part with such precious 
relics. But many things have been 
recovered and as the years pass others 



/iDount IDemon 53 

likewise will be restored to Mount 
Vernon. One absolute rule has been 
adopted, and wisely. Nothing has 
been accepted, even though offered 
as a gift with the best motives, which 
did not relate to Washington or Mount 
Venion, and the greatest care has been 
exercised to prevent imposition even 
by those who believed most firmly in 
the authenticity of relics. Nor has 
this been accomplished without much 
difficulty, care, and resolution, and 
from time to time criticism, based 
sometimes upon hostility, has been 
levelled at them. From time to time, 
indeed, a movement appears to try 
and wrest from their hands this precious 
relic of Washington, based generally 
upon the shrewd contention that 
Washington's home should belong to 
the Government ; with the fact that an 



54 /IDount IDernon 

admission charge is made to visitors, 
as a weapon against them. Such a 
movement was started with so much 
apparent determination some thirty 
years ago that the Regents deemed it 
necessary to seek the advice of counsel. 
They consulted such eminent lawyers 
and judges as the late Hons. Reverdy 
Johnson, John Randolph Tucker, Rich- 
ard T. Merrick, Thomas Durfee, and 
J. P. Comegys, all of whom, without 
consultation among themselves, con- 
curred in the view that their title 
was complete and irrefragable. In the 
course of his opinion, which was laid 
before the authorities of the State of 
Virginia, Mr. Reverdy Johnson de- 
clared the pregnant and incontrovertible 
fact that, however veiled and con- 
cealed, under all of these attempts to 
assail the present method of conducting 



/ffijouut IDernon 55 



Mount Vernon, was to be found, in- 
variably, the effort of some private 
individual or association of persons 
who desire to exploit Mount Vernon 
and the fame of him who made it 
sacred, for private purposes of making 
money out of them. 

It is believed that the Mount Vernon 
Ladies' Association of the Union is the 
first body comprised exclusively of 
ladies, ever incorporated to conduct 
so national and far-reaching an enter- 
prise, and the Association having con- 
ducted it with signal success, wisdom, 
and taste, it is not likely that, even 
though the attempt be made, which 
is not probable, the women of the 
country will ever allow the manage- 
ment of the place so honorable to them 
to be wrested from those who have 
shed so much lustre on them. 



\ 



56 /iDount IDernon 

y ^ 

vv- There are in all about thirty build- 
ings on the Mount Vernon estate: 
the mansion, office, kitchen, butler's 
house, gardener's house, carpenter shop, 
spinning-house, smoke-house, wagon- 
shed, summer-house, spring-house, 
milk-house, shelter-house in deer park, 
servants' quarters — two houses, — a 
corn house, laundry, coach-house ; north 
gate — two lodge-houses, pavilion on 
wharf for passengers, seven cabins for 
employees; west gate — two lodge- 
houses and a bam. All of these have 
been restored and put in perfect 
condition. 

The mansion at Mount Vernon is a 
simple structure of wood, two and a 
half stories in height painted on the 
outside to resemble stone, built on 
colonial lines, in the dignified and 
harmonious form impressive in its very 



/iDoimt Demon 57 

simplicity. The main building is some 
96 feet in length by 47 feet in depth. 
Along its entire front runs a broad 
portico 25 feet in height, with square 
pillars. Curving back from the river 
at either end are colonnades connecting 
it with the offices and out-buildings. 

Fronting the mansion are shaded 
lawns, and below is the deer park, oc- 
cupying about 20 acres. In the rear are 
lawns, gardens, and orchards. About 
150 acres are in woodland and about 70 
acres are utilized for farming operations 
on a moderate scale. The income 
available for the preservation of the 
estate is derived mainly from the ad- 
mission fee, which is esteemed by the 
Regents, not as a charge, but rather as 
a method of extending the privilege of 
aiding in the preservation of Mount 
Vernon to all who may care to visit 



58 /IDount IDernon 

'V- 

there. f/This fee is fixed at twenty-five 
cent^the sum agreed on when the first 
act was passed by the Virginia Legis- 
lature in 1855, and was adopted not 
merely as the chief means of preserving 
the estate, but as a means of protecting 
it against the danger of its becoming the 
common resort for those whose presence 
might endanger the property. This in- 
come, though considerable, is not suffi- 
cient even when added to the interest on 
the inadequate endowment fund, to keep 
up the place and make such restorations 
and improvements as from time to 
time appear necessary, and a number 
of the Regents have at times given or 
raised the required funds to meet the 
necessities of the case. Every en- 
deavor has been made to preserve the 
mansion and its precious contents from 
fire. Not only is no fire permitted in 



/IDount Demon 59 

the mansion itself, but all smoking is 
prohibited on the grounds. As a safe- 
guard against the danger of fire, the 
Association has introduced a hot-water 
plant, not liable to explosion, over- 
heating, or charring of woodwork, the 
boilers being installed outside at a safe 
distance from the mansion. With a 
view to further protection, a modern 
chemical fire apparatus has been in- 
stalled, and watchmen are always 
pacing their beats night and day. 

In the mansion there are nineteen 
rooms and four or five closets or small 
rooms. TheVice-RegentsoftheAssocia- 
tion have to some^ extent divided among 
themselves the care of the various 
apartments of the mansion. All have 
worked together with harmony and with 
equal devotion to the one purpose of 
preserving Mount Vernon as a trust 



6o /IDount IDernon 

sacred to the memory of Washington. j 

No better evidence of the spirit [ 

which has animated these devoted | 

women can be given than the charge i 

to them contained in the farewell 
addressed to them on her final retire- 
ment from the Regency by Miss 
Cunningham. 

To the Council of the Ladies' Mount 
Vernon Association of June, iSy^. 

Ladies: It was my intention as 
well as my duty, to have met you at 
this time and conformed in person to 
the legal requisition accompanying a 
resignation so important as mine, but 
Providence does not permit. 

But in parting I feel it due to you < 

as to me; to the responsibilities I 
solemnly assumed, which were so im- 
portant in their results; to those you 
have taken upon yourselves, to say a 
few words as to those responsibilities 



/IDount Demon 6i 



or duties, laid down in the beginning of 
our work, not to be lightly regarded, 
for they were pledges to future genera- 
tions as well as to ours. The minds and 
hearts which conceived the rescue of 
the home of Washington; of the com- 
pletion of a worthy ''tribute" to 
public integrity and private virtue; an 
expression of the gratitude due and 
felt by a country destined to act such 
an important part in the drama of the 
world; conceived it with all the rev- 
erence felt in older regions for the 
resting-place of their honored dead; 
where only pious hands are permitted 
to be in ''charge" so as to have them 
carried down to admiring ages in the 
same conditions as when left. 

Such was the pledge made to the 
American heart when an appeal was 
made to it to save the home and tomb 
of Washington, the Father of his 
Country, from all change, whether by 
law or desecration; such to the last 



62 /iDount Demon 



owner of Mount Vernon, ere he was 
willing to permit it to pass from his 
hands; such to the Legislature of his 
Mother State ere she gave us legal 
rights over it; such are we bound to 
keep. Our honor is concerned, as 
well as our intelligence and legal 
obligations. The mansion and the 
grounds around it should be religiously 
guarded from change — should be kept 
as Washington left them. 
L^^^adies, the home of Washington is 
f-rM^/^-^ your charge; see to it that you keep 
it the home of Washington. Let no 
irreverent hand change it; no vandal 
hands desecrate it with the changes of 
progress. Those who go to the home 
in which he lived and died wish to see 
in what he lived and died. Let one 
spot in this grand country of ours be 
saved from change. Upon you rests 
this duty. 

When the centennial comes, bringing 
with it its thousands from the ends of 



/IDount IDernon 63 



the earth, to whom the home of 
Washington will be the place of places 
in our country, let them see that, 
though we slay our forests, remove 
our dead, pull down our churches, 
remove from home to home, till the 
hearthstone seems to have no resting 
place in America; let them see that we 
do know how to care for the home of 
our hero. Farewell! 

Ladies, I return to your hands the 
office so long held — since December 
2d, 1853. 

Respectfully, 
Ann Pamela Cunningham. 

June I, 1874. 

It is no more than truth to say that 
those to whom this lofty appeal was 
addressed have kept their trust with 
the faith of the vestals of Rome. 

Few persons realize how closely 
Mount Vernon was identified with 



64 /IDouixt IDernon 



Washington's life. And without this 
one can scarcely wholly realize the 
complete lesson of the majestic sim- 
plicity of this most impressive tomb of 
mortal man. 

The number of biographies of Wash- 
ington that have been written almost 
exceed account, and they vary all the 
way from pictures so distorted as to be 
hardly worthy of contempt; and, in all 
of them which have the least claim to 
fidelity, the influence of Washington's 
home is felt. Nor could it help being 
so if one takes the least trouble to 
study the conditions amid which his 
powers sprung. Here he grew up 
from youth to manhood, fishing, swim- 
ming, roaming over the hills which he 
was later to own, reflecting, and writing 
down his reflections on Rules of Con- 
duct; sttidying and practising survey- 




i 
I 



/IDount Demon 65 

ing; hunting with an ardor and a bold 
horsemanship which, with his zeal and 
care as a surveyor, was to commend 
him to Lord Fairfax — himself a keen 
sportsman — and lay the foimdation of 
his fortune. Here he had his early 
love affairs, and essayed the only r61e 
in which he failed: that of a poet. 
Here he learned the Gentleman's Art 
of Fence, from the two old campaigners, 
with whom he was later to have so sad 
an experience at ''Fort Necessity.'* 
Hence he started forth on his early 
civil career as a young surveyor be- 
yond the mountains. Hence he was 
sumimoned at the age of twenty-one 
to receive and bear the despatches 
of Governor Dinwiddie to the French 
post on the upper Ohio. Hence, a 
little later on, he set forth again 
to conduct the ill-starred expedition 



66 /IDount IDernon 

which ended at Great Meadows; and 
to act as aide and guide for Braddock 
in his fatal campaign. Here, amid 
the gathering gloom of the impending 
cloud of revolution, he meditated on 
those mighty problems which were 
then agitating all serious minds and on 
whose solution depended the fate, 
possibly, of all mankind. At Mount 
Vernon he stood for the General 
Assembly of Virginia, where he was 
described by a friend, Mr. Atkinson, 
as "cool, like a Bishop at his prayers, " 
and here he stood for Congress, moving 
steadily more and more to the front. 
It was after this election to the Con- 
tinental Congress that Mr. Henry and 
Mr. Pendleton came by Mount Vernon 
to pick him up and ride to Philadelphia 
with him, and it was during their visit 
here that Mrs. Washington was quoted 



/IDount IDernon 67 

by Pendleton as talking "like a 
Spartan mother to her son on going 
into battle,'* and hoping that "they 
wotild stand firm. She knew George 
would. " It was here he later received 
the news of his appointment to the 
Command-in-Chief of the American 
forces, as, years after, he received the 
news of his nomination and later of 
his election as President of the great 
Republic he had done so much to 
make. It is said that he was absent 
from Mount Vernon for more than 
seven years during the Revolutionary 
War, without once returning home; 
but his letters show how present the 
place was ever in his thoughts. When, 
while at Boston licking his undisciplined 
and ragged troops into the shape of an 
army, the rumor reached him that his 
place was to be destroyed by Lord 



68 /ttount IDernon 

Dunmore as an act of reprisal against 
the Rebel Commander-in-Chief, his 
mind was disturbed by his wife's 
situation, but it was untroubled by the 
danger to his home, as dearly as he 
loved it. He writes to his distant 
kinsman and manager, Lund Wash- 
ington, and gives him directions about 
his estate, in words which Irving 
properly terms "noble." "Let the 
hospitality of the house in respect to 
the poor, '' he says, "be kept up. Let 
no one go away hungry. If any of 
this kind of people should be in want of 
corn, supply their necessaries, provided 
it does not encourage them in idleness, 
and I have no objection to your giving 
my money in charity to the amount 
of forty or fifty pounds a year when 
you think it well bestowed. What 
I mean by having no objection is, 



/Rount Demon 69 

that it is my desire that it should be 
done. You are to consider that neither 
myself nor my wife is in the way to do 
these good things. " 

Much later on when, in the spring 
of 1 78 1, the affairs of the Republic 
appeared at their lowest ebb, and 
Arnold, commanding at Portsmouth, 
was ravaging the coast and the banks 
of the Virginia rivers; while Phillips 
was ravaging the regions lying along 
her interior waters, Lund Washing- 
ton secured immunity for Mount Ver- 
non by furnishing one of Phillips^s 
warships with provisions, whereupon 
Washington wrote him a strong rebuke. 
''It would," he writes, ''have been a 
less painful circumstance to me to 
have heard that in consequence of your 
non-compliance with their request, they 
had burned my house and laid my 



70 /IDount IDernon 

plantation in ruins." But, whatever 
his own feeHngs were in this embarrass- 
ing situation, we may, at least at the 
end of this long time, rejoice that his 
agent had the address to save, not only 
for Washington but for posterity, this 
precious reHc of the past. And when 
two years later, on Christmas eve, 
Washington having the day before, at 
Annapolis, resigned his commission 
into the hands of Congress, reached 
Mount Vernon, he too must have 
been gratefiil to God for the preserva- 
tion of his home. 

He expressed the hope that he might 
be allowed to "spend the remainder 
of his days in cultivating the affections 
of good men and in the practice of 
domestic virtues," and his letters to 
his old comrades in arms glow with the 
happiness of being once more at home. 



/IDount IDernon 71 

But it was not to be. Very soon 
Mount Vernon began to attract visitors 
from all quarters. They were received 
in the frank country style of a quiet 
gentleman and his sensible wife, who, 
with easy graciousness, dispensed her 
unaffected hospitality, keeping her 
hands occupied and her mind tranquil, 
while she diligently plied her swift 
knitting needles, as was the custom of 
most Virginia matrons. 

The knowledge of the exactions of 
his situation in having to entertain 
such a flood of visitors, led the Supreme 
Council of Pennsylvania to instruct 
their delegates in Congress to call the 
attention of that body to the extra- 
ordinary expense entailed upon him, 
with a view to producing some national 
reward for his eminent services. Be- 
fore proceeding further, however, a 



72 jflDount IDernon 

copy of these instructions was sent to 
Washington for his approbation, but 
the suggestion was gratefully and re- 
spectfully declined; Washington, as 
Irving says, "jealously maintaining 
the satisfaction of having served his 
country at the sacrifice of his private 
interests." 

The limits of this paper will not ad- 
mit of further relation in detail of the 
later summons which came to him to 
surrender his retirement, for the good of 
the country; or of the great and deci- 
sive part he bore in the tremendous 
struggle which was yet before him, and 
in harmonizing the conflicting interests 
of the new and sovereign States to 
which his genius had recently given 
self-government and liberty. Washing- 
ton's influence was the one thing felt by 
all; his wisdom and character almost 



/IDount Demon 73 

the one national asset in which all 
claimed a part. Here at Mount Ver- 
non was the single centre to which all 
looked with equal affection. His home 
became the headquarters of the great 
forces of union and peace, as his tent 
had been the headquarters of war. 
Coimselling, arguing, urging, chiding, 
beseeching, he spread abroad the 
national spirit until it covered the 
land, and the great victory was won 
in the achievement of a National 
Constitution. 

The natural result was, of course, 
that he was called from his retirement 
to take his place and guide the frail 
bark, just launched, through the tumul- 
tuous seas which still threatened her 
instant destruction. 

An entry in his diary, dated the i6th 
of April, 1789, says: 



74 /IDount Demon 

About 10 o'clock I bade adieu to 
Mount Vernon, to private life, and to 
domestic felicity; and with a mind op- 
pressed with more anxious and painful 
sensations than I have words to ex- 
press, set out for New York with the 
best disposition to render service to 
my country in obedience to its call, 
but with less hope of answering its 
expectations. 

The great work he performed during 
the following eight years, the method 
he adopted in bringing about him the 
many great men of divergent and 
often fiercely hostile views, such, for ex- 
ample, as Jefferson and Hamilton, and 
inducing them all to work for the 
common good, until out of contrary 
elements he had brought a stable 
and abiding Nation and Government, 
though one of the mightiest tasks any 



/iDount Demon 75 

man has ever accomplished, is foreign to 
the scope of this sketch. Throughout 
it all, his thoughts ever turned to his 
beloved home, and in the hour of his 
greatest triumph his heart sighed for 
the sweet retirement of Mount Vernon. 
His return to Motint Vernon at the 
close of his second administration was 
like a triumphant progress. Towns and 
villages united in doing him honor, but 
when he arrived at home he instantly 
merged into a private gentleman, and 
he who had influenced the destinies 
of the world and established a new 
form of government for mankind, gave 
himself up to, and thereby forever en- 
nobled the calling of, a simple planter. 
He expressed his hope that the re- 
mainder of his life might be occupied 
in the amusement of agricultural and 
rural pursuits, and his expectation 



76 /iDount IDernon 

never thenceforth to go more than 
twenty miles from his home. 

We have a picture of his Hfe at 
Mount Vernon at this time, given by 
himself in a letter to his friend James 
McHenry, Secretary of War. 

I am indebted to you [he writes] 
for several unacknowledged letters, 
but never mind that; go on as if you 
had answers. You are the source of 
information, and can find many things 
to relate, while I have nothing to say 
that coiild either inform or amuse a 
Secretary of War in Philadelphia. I 
might tell him that I began my diurnal 
course with the sim; that, if my hire- 
lings are not in their places at that 
time, I send them messages of sorrow 
for their indisposition; that having put 
these wheels in motion, I examine the 
state of things further; that the more 
they are probed the deeper I find the 
wounds which my buildings have sus- 



/IDount IDernon 77 



tained by an absence and neglect of 
eight 3^ears; that by the time I have 
accompHshed these matters, breakfast 
(a little after seven o'clock, about the 
time, I presume, you are taking leave 
of Mrs. McHenry) is ready; that, this 
being over, I moimt my horse and ride 
arovmd the farms; which employs me 
until it is time to dress for dinner, 
at which I rarely miss seeing strange 
faces, come, as they say, out of respect 
to me. Pray, would not the word 
curiosity answer as well.'^ And how 
different this from having a few social 
friends at a cheerful board. The usual 
time of sitting at table, a walk, and 
tea brings me with the dawn of candle 
light; previous to which, if not pre- 
vented by company, I resolve that, as 
soon as the glimmering taper supplies 
the place of the great luminary, I will 
retire to my writing table and ac- 
knowledge the letters I have received; 
but when the lights are brought I feel 



78 /iDount Demon 

tired and disinclined to engage in this 
work, conceiving that the next night 
will do as well. The next night comes 
and with it the same causes for post- 
ponement, and so on. Having given 
you the history of a day, it will serve 
for a year, and, I am persuaded, you 
will not require a second edition of it. 
But it may strike you that in this detail 
no mention is made of any portion of 
time allotted for reading. The remark 
would be just, for I have not looked 
into a book since I came home; nor 
shall I be able to do it until I discharge 
my workmen; probably not before the 
lights grow longer, when possibly I 
may be looking in Doomsday Book. 

The fame of its master brought to 
Mount Vernon at this time so con- 
tinued a concourse of visitors that the 
strain on the host and hostess was 
becoming somewhat too heavy, and 



/IDount IDernon 79 

Washington wrote and invited his 
nephew, Lawrence Lewis, to come and 
make his home with him and re- 
lieve him somewhat of the burden of 
hospitaHty. 

Whenever it is convenient to you [he 
says] to make this place your home, I 
shall be glad to see you .... As both 
your aunt and I are in the decline of 
life, and regular in our habits, especially 
in our hours of rising and going to bed, 
I require some person (fit and proper) 
to ease me of the trouble of entertaining 
company, particularly of nights, as it 
is my inclination to retire (and unless 
pYevented by very particiilar company, 
I always do retire) either to bed or to 
my study, soon after candle light. In 
taking those duties (which hospitality 
obliges me to bestow on company) off 
my hands it would render me a very 
acceptable service. 



8o /iDount Demon 



As might have been expected, the 
presence in the same house of the 
young aide-de-camp and of Miss Nel- ^ 
lie Custis, Mrs. Washington's grand- 
daughter who, with her brother, George 
Washington Parke Custis, had, on 
their father's death, been adopted by 
General Washington, resulted by a 
natural sequence in a romance, and | 

they were married at Mount Vernon ! 

on the 22d of February, 1799, where- 
upon Washington arranged to settle 
them on a portion of the Mount Vernon ' 

lands which he had set apart in his ; 

will for the young lady. » 

He had not long to enjoy the society ' 

of the young married couple. Inured 
all his life to physical hardships and to 
outdoor life in all weathers, he did not 
comprehend fully that however robust 
his health may be, a man past sixty- 




Wedding Day of Nellie Custis 



/IDount Demon 8i 

seven, who has spent ten years of his 
life in the exhausting exactions of the 
closest, cannot endiire what he might 
have stood with ease in his earlier life. 
A ride over his estates one winter 
morning, the 12th of December, con- 
tinued for several hours in a storm 
which began with snow, passed into 
hail and ''then turned into a settled 
cold rain," followed by an afternoon 
passed imprudently without changing 
his damp clothes, brought on the next 
day a deep cold and hoarseness, which 
settled in his throat and that night he 
was seized with a chill, followed by a 
violent attack, and he rapidly sank 
to his end before midnight the follow- 
ing night. Thus passed the physical 
life of the greatest man the world has 
yet known, leaving his memory for all 
men to revere and his home a shrine 



82 /count IDernon 



for all men to honor. By his will he 
left to his dearly beloved wife, Martha 
Washington, the use, profit, and benefit 
of his whole estate, real and personal, 
for the term of her natural life, except 
certain parts which were especially 
disposed of otherwise, and at her death 
he left, as we have seen, to his nephew, 
Bushrod Washington, the greater part of 
Moimt Vernon, including the mansion. 

— Partly [he said], in consideration of 
an intimation to his deceased father, 
while we were bachelors and he had 
kindly undertaken to superintend my 
estate during my military service in the 
former War between Great Britain and 
France; that if I should fall therein. 
Mount Vernon, then less extensive in 
domain than at present, should become 
his property. 

His body was laid to rest amid the 



/IDount IDernou 83 



lamentations of a people, in a spot 
which he had himself selected for his 
last repose, and there in a simplicity 
more majestic than the grandeur of the 
tomb of Napoleon under the mighty 
dome of the Invalides, his sacred ashes 
rest to-day, making a fitting shrine 
for him whose life was stamped with 
the simplicity of truth. The preser- 
vation of this shrine has been accom- 
plished by the pious labors of the 
women of the coimtry, and to them 
the country owes its gratitude. Here 
the representatives of the whole world 
come to do him honor, and as great 
soldiers learn in his campaign the 
highest lessons of the art of war, and 
great statesmen study in his life the 
yet higher lessons of the art of govern- 
ment, so they come to find in the 
simplicity of his home one of the great 



84 /Roiint Demon 

secrets of noble living. Here they 
shall find the exact surroundings amid 
which Washington lived when at home ; 
the noble simplicity of the home of 
the greatest man of all the ages. 

Thomas Nelson Page. 

The first edition of Dr. Thomas Nelson 
Pagers book on Mount Vernon and Its Pre- 
servation is issued by the generous dona- 
tion of Mr. Charles N. Dietz, of Omaha, 
Nebraska, to whom I express the thanks of 
the Association. 

Rebekah S. Manderson, 
OJ Committee on Publication. 



^C% 8 1910 



7^ 2.-2- 



.^ Y^\ 



-K 



H 



^ne copy del. to Cat. Div. 



H^ ■ d i^'ui*- 



